289 W, ICU
ten hours with
blades and tubes
three transfusions and
she laughs quietly says
that none of the blood
in her veins
is her own anymore
it’s entirely foreign
her skin is white
like the walls
the light bends off
her face
glows through her IVs
there are too many sounds
and I’m not sure if
they’re in the room or
in my head
her stitches cling to
severed tissue
her scars will match mine
I drink the
bitter hospital coffee
everything smells of
sterile sheets and iodine
she says she’s sorry
about how close she came
I don’t remember
the last time
she apologized
to me
but maybe it’s
the drugs
I don’t know
what to say
so I sit and listen
to the sound of her
IV drip and slow breaths
take bitter breath
and trace it up
her neck,
warm against your
fingerprints that
dance and press
into her throat
your short sleeves
leave your arms
warm and honest
in the sunlight
you will sink
into the spaces
between her ribs
and rot in her mouth
in the weight behind
her eyes
when nothing is
dark enough
to kill the
white light
the summer that
I returned from
the hospital
you grabbed my
left arm and
pressed your thumb
into the skin
below my elbow
and asked me
if I had an accident.
I said yes.
this Mother’s Day
you hugged me
far too tight and
said that
I was a woman now
that I should look for
a nice boy
you pulled out
pictures
of my childhood
faded with the sun
kept them in
your wallet
close to the warmth
of your chest.
I know you hated
the way I was
almost as much
as I did
but
you held me close
to make up for
the distance
between us.
I hate it.
I inhaled the smoke
and I felt it trace
down my lungs
hot and sharp
your face was
golden in the glow
of the embers
you held your
cigarette downward
in the rain
you said
you could tell
that I got nervous
around my parents
that you were sorry
that you noticed
you weren’t the
first to say
I was the most difficult
person to read
you said
I should take
my shirt off
so the smoke
didn’t stick
to my clothes
but I couldn’t.
the rain
dampened your hair
and we shut off
the lights
and I watched your
eyes
in the dark
you smiled when
I said I knew
that Ian Curtis
hung himself
from his closet ceiling
and you hummed
the Pixies
under your breath
I wondered if
you smile like that
all the time
or just tonight
with
two minutes
of tobacco and
too much
silence.
everything is warm
I am shaking
in the heat
this sickness
fills up the
drain and
I don’t mind
I prefer
this blur
more colors
than shapes
more sounds
than words
I don’t
have to move
I knew a boy
who kissed his
lover full of
midnight cigarettes
and broken collar bones
he tasted of
late night telephone calls
and poems written
on soggy diner napkins
who taught me
that there are times
where skin on skin
won’t burn holes
in your veins
he left
marks
up my arm
in the shape of
the stars
saying
you will only fade
with the sun
your voice
was dry
when you
whispered,
and the words
scraped along
your throat,
settled
in the bedsheets,
and you smiled.
but your eyes
stayed
dark and deep.
when you press
your words
into me
I could die.
you were right.
maybe I shouldn’t
have tried to
exhale my fears
out of your
bedroom window,
because it made
the thoughts heavier.
I was too scared
that I might
wake up to
my blood
in your sheets
and know
too well
where it came from.
right now
everything hurts, but
I can repeat
nothing hurts
until my lips
are numb and
my mouth learns
to taste lies like
they are the truth.
maybe the
pressure of his body
will take away
the weight
of your thoughts
and press them
into your mattress.
your laugh is like
every new day
with a reason to
breathe, and
you looked so sure
with your chin
held high.
I hope you keep
laughing at
my indecision.
I never knew what
safety tasted like
until you breathed it
into my skin.
I’d forgotten the
chemical pulse of
missing a dose
(holy fuck)
but I fall in love
with each new word
you say
and as long as
you mean them,
that’s alright.
Shrill as a choir of children,
Urgent like the first day of May,
False and inflatable feeling,
Tugs at my senses,
big as the Macy’s Parade.
you’ve got
all the
fucking answers
unless
I need them
I lost
the first part
of what you said
against all of
the noise
and the thoughts
holy fuck
I always knew
I was sick
but I can’t decide
if I want to feel more
or feel less
I don’t know
if it’s better
to do the right thing
at the wrong time
or the wrong thing
at the right time
jesus fucking christ
if I’m making
the wrong choices
fix them
fix me
don’t
fucking ask me
what I want
to do
I’m sorry
I’m so good at
opening up
in the wrong way
why the fuck
do I feel like
I’m dying
if I’m
far too alive
when she
stopped shaking
on the hotel bed
her sheets stuck
to her back
coated in
a week of
sweat and detox
a second skin
she saw light
it kissed her eyelids
danced across
the carpet
she told me
she wasn’t sure
if she was
entering heaven
or simply
leaving hell
I found that shirt
stained with
blood, and your spit,
and your tears
it smells of
your father’s cheap beer
and your mother’s
expensive tequila
and the three cups
of coffee that followed
that night
I never washed out
the smell of your skin
your sweat
mixed with mine
your weight
pressed to my chest
in your room
I know it helps
to say I remember less
than I do
but
my mother always said
that less is more
fuck it, maybe
more is less
I.
I can fill up a
bathroom sink
with the things
I should have said.
II.
I’m still not sure
if that’s beautiful
or fucked up.
III.
maybe it’s just
beautiful
because it’s
fucked up.
IV.
Grandad,
your tile
was stained
like roses.
V.
you bowled a cricket ball
across the green
into his shin
he didn’t cry.
VI.
you told us
after half a year
that you had cancer
he cried.
VII.
the boy next door
killed a bird with a stone
I watched the blood
pool on the hot concrete.
VIII.
his mother scraped the organs
from the driveway with a kitchen knife
washed it clean
with a garden hose.
IX.
my brother collected the eggs
in a cardboard box
with no warmth
they rotted.
I punched the doorframes
of bathroom stalls
until my knuckles bled
and ran warm
turned the color
of the setting sun
I hit the palm
of my left hand
against the bone of
my right wrist and
hoped that I could
break this up enough
that it would slide
through my veins
without getting caught
in my windpipe
but I never said a word
I still responded to
he or she and
left the girls locker room
when they told me to
I can still feel
your fencepost
digging into my ribs
staining my shirt
dark red
above my hips
I’ve spent
my whole life
reading the
illegible script
of psychiatrists
it took them
three hours
for an evaluation
ten seconds
for a prescription
I never could
spell psychiatrist right
maybe because
I never wrote
a word about them
maybe because
they wrote
too many about me
fuck signatures
I’ll print
in messy font
and I won’t use
my full name
unless
you’re over my shoulder
saying
we gave you such
a beautiful name
use it.
unless you’re sitting
on the couch and
she’s staring
and you’re saying
she doesn’t speak much
I was never one
for your Christmas gatherings
or your family photos
they gave me the worst
fear of cameras
and Jesus
but I guess
learned to
point a lens
at what I found beautiful
to forgive Jesus
for forgiving me
for forgiving him
it makes me sick
to think that
I’m trembling and
missing all the things
that
haven’t happened
yet
and hating all the
things that have
it makes me sick
to know I’m so selfish
that you have it
so much worse
and you still
hold yourself higher
and speak with
a clearer tongue
and love with
a firmer touch
thank God
I never learned
to say half the things
I think
but thank God
that you do.
just because
I hurt
does not mean
I deserve
an apology
just because
you received
an apology
does not mean
you hurt
